


Adoration

by guybriefly



Category: Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero
Genre: Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Love Confessions, M/M, Rippen's confused heart, Slight OOC
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-10
Updated: 2016-01-28
Packaged: 2018-05-13 00:23:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5687422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/guybriefly/pseuds/guybriefly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>He never imagined Larry to feel anything but... annoying. The essence of self-absorbed chatter-chatter-chatter. Hour after hour of being wrapped up in himself. Was he selfish? Maybe, he’d forget others’ names and seemed off in his own bubble half of the time, but-</em><br/><em>But he was full of love, wasn’t he?</em> <br/>Although Rippen despises his Number 2's saccharine nature, he knows he can never replace Larry. And that's when he falls in love. Hilarity ensues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Monday

It was Monday; Monday he realised that something was wrong.

Kid’s Show World. A saccharine pit in which that awful trio allied with the cuddle-bunny populace to defeat him – Rippen – and rid him of any hope he had for the day. Of course he’d be vanquished when Penn Zero so _valiantly_ used the power of friendship (and simple, _very_ simple maths) to defeat him. Of course the episodic song-and-dance number would give the heroes time to escape. Of course his attempts to fight back would be dashed: the sword he pulled turned into foam in his hands; the dagger into a butter knife; a string of curses into a black box of censorship that choked his mouth and of _course_ his useless sidekick was of no help.

As he gagged, coughing up smaller black boxes and pounding his chest with a nub-finger hand, Larry was sitting aside, reading the storytime tale to an audience of children. Their forms were inconvenient, to say the least. This world was child-proofed to the teeth. The only indication of his evil nature were the thick eyebrows above his large, sweet eyes, even his hair was rounded, he no longer looked like a bird of prey but a sweet, harmless thing that could do little more than steal cookies from the protagonist and set off a snowball of moral (and simple mathematical) lessons.

And Larry. _Larry._ While Rippen himself was a computer-generated, smooth-bodied teddy bear of a thing, Larry was... soft. He’d always been soft. Now, here, he was a puppet. Hadn’t he always been a puppet, as well? But this time, _literally;_ he had beady eyes and a hinge mouth, as if he were controlled by a hand beneath him, and he was no bigger than the children who sat cross-legged in front of him and his oversized book. It was titled ‘Cuddle Bunny and the Green-Eyed Bully’. The cover illustrated a sketch-doodle rabbit and whatever _Rippen_ was. Hugging. He could retch.

When he was done retching, he waited for Larry to finish reading to the children so he could leave this awful, sugar-sweet, garish-coloured hellscape and wallow in the humiliation of his defeat once more. No doubt, Larry would return with him and talk, talk, talk, insisting that it wasn’t that bad and chastising him and then disappearing on a tangent – disappearing to his home, far away, far away from Rippen and his lonely soul. That man could talk the hind legs off a donkey.

But now he was allowed to talk. Allowed to tell stories. It was his purpose in this world.

He looked overjoyed.

Larry did the voices. Larry did the hand movements. Larry’s puppet head turned to ask all the children, one by one, what part of the story they liked best. The too-pink felt lining of Larry’s mouth was bright as he threw his head back and laughed in agreement. He called the children his little Larrylings. An artificial twinkle illuminated his eye.

The music began. The show was over. The children slumped, limp; the colour drained from their surroundings; the world had stopped and would begin again tomorrow, at 7.30AM sharp.

There was a flash of red.

They were back in Fish Stick on a Stick. Back to the wordless, disapproving glare of the balding, beauty-spotted old man at the control panel. Words began to spill in a great waterfall out of Larry’s mouth. A single hitch of breath and the dam broke. Out came the story of the day and all the stories it reminded him of, a list of all the candies he liked as a child, a list of all the dentists he’d been to, a list of all the dentist chairs he’d broken by messing with the tilt settings when the dentist left the room.

And then they were walking home and he was asking Rippen about _his_ favourite candies, not giving him time to answer before making assumptions and going off on another tangent about – Rippen wasn’t sure – some dog he owned, or something his mother told him. Rippen might as well have been on another planet. He hadn’t the energy to listen anymore. Each day drained him a little more – the art of the children didn’t _resonate_ with him like it used to, like it did when he first became an artist, not when it was new and optimistic and not a façade to hide his evil motives. Even villainy? Even villainy had become dull, day-to-day, and working both jobs drained him so much nowadays, he could just drop dead where he stood.

When he realised that even anger was unreachable right now, he took a deep breath of the night’s air and felt his muscles twitch at the grating rattle of the late night traffic.

‘And I said, if you’re such a cool guy, where are _your_ platform boots- you okay, sweetie?’

_‘Yes.’_ It came out as a groan, it came out with a roll of the eyes. Usually, he’d keep his head to the front and inhale the night and grease and grime, but this time, the sudden divergence of Larry’s mostly-monologue made him turn his head.

Larry looked worried. For a fraction of a second, concern had pierced his face. The lines of mirth and graceful age on his forehead cut deeper into his brow. If wounds, they’d have been fatal. They looked pulled, by invisible hands, upwards, his brow furrowing in panic. But it was only for a second.

Then his expression quivered. He smiled.

‘Good! Good.’ Dabbing at his lips with a worn-down chapstick, his eyes fluttered shut. ‘Now, as I was saying, where are _your_ platform boots, cool guy, this is a team effort, and he’s like...’

But now Rippen was transfixed. It was the first time he’d actually paid attention to Larry while he was talking in what felt like forever. Almost tripping over the pavement, missing a beat in a distracted quickstep, Rippen’s brow creased. Had he been...? No, he couldn’t have. He never imagined Larry to feel anything but... annoying. The essence of self-absorbed chatter-chatter-chatter. Hour after hour of being wrapped up in himself. Was he selfish? Maybe, he’d forget others’ names and seemed off in his own bubble half of the time, but-

But he was full of love, wasn’t he?

Rippen felt his heart flutter in his chest.

Even after Larry had left him, saying that he needed to get home quickly and feed- feed- whatever that elephant’s name was, he could feel it. Even as Larry could still be heard chattering to himself as their paths forked (pausing only to sing out ‘Bye, Rippen!’), Rippen could feel the flutter of butterflies in his ribcage, bursting his chest and tickling each breath. He didn’t realise he’d been holding it until the boom of train tracks made him jump, left him winded and slightly frazzled.

Something about Larry was magical. Just magical. Thinking about it now made him feel fuzzy all over; he flexed his hands restlessly and put the thought of getting a late cup of coffee aside. Shot through, he was utterly knackered by a day of Penn Zero and his insufferable ensemble knocking him down but this time the bitter blackness wouldn’t help. Every day was the same circle of disappointment, possibility, disappointment, and even though evil burned in his veins, roared through his every word and through his heartbeat like a pounding doomsday drum. He was evil. Dignified, polished, machine. Every inch of him, every drop of blood, it was the blood of an uncaring mastermind who did what he pleased and- and- and-

And he could kill Larry, effortlessly. If he became useless, cumbersome. It could be ended before the little man had time to ask what he was doing. There wouldn’t even be a parting word. Not even a glance. He’d told himself before – he’d tried to _act_ upon the notion before – that he needed a better sidekick. At any moment, in any mission, he could destroy that little nuisance and call it a horrific accident.

He stopped in his tracks. The train echoed into the dark.

Good god, what was he _thinking?_

Love isn’t just when you don’t want to kill someone.

_What was he thinking?_

What was he _feeling,_ more importantly? Something that he refused to believe. He had felt infatuation, and felt the shame of having it dashed. Starblaster had blasted a hole in his heart. He had felt trust for Larry, even respect, and felt the disappointment of being proved wrong. But every slip-up, every ramble, every spanner in the works, why did he- how could he- forgive Larry every time?

Could it be that he found the man closer to his heart than he expected? Could it be that what was once annoyance had turned into endearment? Was he growing soft? Was every moment of forgiveness, every broken promise to himself to better discipline his Number 2, turning him gentle and rotting his evil core?

No.

_No._

Fury overwhelmed him. Disgust at his own flood of emotion. Hatred for this confusion. His chest burned and he felt dizzy, sick, full, his heart bursting and ribcages cracking with anger at how foolish and bewildered and betrayed he felt. He staggered back, drunken. A woman walking the other way veered to avoid him. Dogs barked in a nearby pen. Rippen supported himself against a wall. The angry back and forth of the same couple sounded through a shuttered window for the third night straight. Rippen’s chest grew tight. The noise of night animals resounded. A dustbin lid clattered to the floor. Rippen twisted at the cloth of his shirt, the night prodding him like a wild animal until he could take no more.

He let out a scream of frustration. His mouth fell open. Spittle flew. Tension released, his shoulders fell loose. The roar, purely animalistic, raw and bloody and ferocious, lasted for only a few seconds before dissolving into a death rattle behind his teeth.

Silence fell, then the world began. Someone in an upper apartment cursed. The dogs began to bark again, louder than before, in competition with the spike-haired Edward Hyde skulking through their night. The couple paused, then continued, their silhouettes frantic and gesturing behind the shades. The woman who’d careened out of his path doubled her pace behind him.

Whatever happened to still nights?

Ashamed, embarrassed, his exercise in expression pointless, he climbed the stairs to his home.

Larry was useless. Useless at destroying heroes, destroying lives, destroying anything but Rippen. Rippen, he was tearing apart. It had not been gradual. It had been a sudden realisation and now Rippen was gasping for air, pawing helplessly at his book of failures.

He knew Larry was an expert at ruining him, but why in this way?

_Was he in love?_

In his own home, in his own bed, it seemed fitting, finally safe for him to think it; even aloud to himself; and he said, aloud, _no._ Then a flurry of whispers, _no, no, no,_ it was unthinkable, couldn’t be possible, but it _could. But it could!_

It would destroy him as a villain. It would destroy any credibility he had. Being in love – hopelessly in love - with one’s underling – one’s incompetent underling – was a death sentence for the career of a villain. Part time, full time, it was the end of times.

But it was possible.

But it was likely.

But it was true.

Rippen, fully clothed, lay back in bed and tried to sleep, his failures heavy on his chest.


	2. Tuesday

It was Tuesday; Tuesday he realised that he was in love.

He realised while lying in bed. The sun spilled in through the shutters. They’d broken when he’d yanked the cord too hard in a fit of rage and each slat had fallen askew like a broken ladder through which the morning’s first rays flooded. The book was still on his chest. His bedhead, atrocious. His clothes, crumpled and stinking with sweat. His head, pounding. Pounding at his skull. The thundering hoofbeats of a faraway headache.

His heart, still heavy. Still full and confused. He wanted, briefly, to tear it out of his chest, throw it in a horrid arc and watch it fall, wet, against the wall.

Sprawled on the wrinkled sheets, one hand lolling off the bed, squinting in the light. A picture of torment, of sleeplessness. The debris of his catastrophic attempt to sleep littered his lounging form: a glass that had rolled precariously to the edge of the bed; spilled final drops of milk from that glass; butter candy wrappers; two other books that had failed to hold his interest and his phone, which had wakened him after only two hours of sleep with the low buzz of an incoming text ,and another, turning into a barrage that could only mean one motormouth.

Larry.

_R, I had the weirdest dream, text me back when you’re awake ok big guy_

Then a too-vivid description of his dream – something something vampires, something something hamster wheel - and an onslaught of emoticons and acronyms that made Rippen’s head ache. Text speak. He couldn’t stand it, let alone understand it. But the fond feeling of having Larry’s attention, being the first person the man contacted with even the most inconsequential details, it writhed in his stomach and a lopsided smile cracked his face.

Seconds later the warmth in his breast was too fierce to ignore. Seconds later and he almost dropped his phone, defeated by the realisation. It was all so sudden – in hindsight, it had been building slowly like the swell of an orchestra but it felt as if it were all at once, as if it were a bursting dam of emotion that had been bricked up by his own villainous blindness.

So his arm hung off the bed; his head lolled to one side; denial had not worked and so he skipped straight to begrudging acceptance.

He was in love.

He only rolled out of bed when he checked his phone again, seeing that it was high time he rose from his pit of iniquity and faced the day. The numbers flashing on the screen mocked him. It took all of the morning’s restraint to resist flinging the phone (smart phone? _Stupid_ phone) at a wall. What he wouldn’t give to live Larry’s life of leisure; what he wouldn’t give to live it by his side. Crushing his cheeks as he wiped his face with his hand, tears welled in his eyes and he groaned, long and angry, gritting his teeth.

Why was everything working against him? Why was the world so insistent on getting in his way? If he wanted to become a full time villain, one of the best, he had to leave this behind; even if it was like vines ensnaring him under his skin, full time villains did not fall in love. He had to tear this feeling out. He had to rip it from inside him. Brushing his teeth, foaming at the mouth, he growled, chagrin vibrating from his lungs to his molars.

He was _not_ in love. He was too old to fall in love. Only children fell in love. Yesterday’s acceptance meant nothing to today’s indignation.

It meant nothing, until he walked into school. Walked in from the comfortable spot averting the gauntlet of sprinklers, only to see Larry. Larry, his new worst enemy, the new bane of his existence, saying hello to all of the staff and handing them tangerine slices and telling them the moral benefits of citrus fruits and pulling new tangerines out of his bag when the one he was holding was finished and _how many tangerines did he have in there?_

He felt his stomach flip. The man broke into his house. He’d made gloves with his fingerprints to get past his security. This tiny man had infiltrated him with such intimacy that it seemed absent in his treatment of others. Of course Larry loved others – he loved everyone!- but Rippen staggered away from the held-out tangerine segment when the thought came into his mind. Was Larry in love with him?

Larry loved everything that lived and moved and breathed. Combing through his hair with one hand as the principal’s eyes widened in confusion, Rippen barely met the criteria. He wasn’t special and it made his blood boil.

Two days. Two days, barely that, and Larry was ripping Rippen to shreds and oblivious to it. He couldn’t let this happen but there was no way he could stop it; he’d never felt this powerless in his life and he’d never seen Larry so powerful thusly.

‘You okay?’ Larry popped the rejected segment into his mouth and chewed it, taking Rippen’s hand. His fingertips were still damp from the fruit. ‘You get my text?’

Rippen hesitated and he knew Larry could sense it.

He snatched his hand away. ‘Yes, I got your _text._ You’ve had that dream before.’

He wanted to rip the feeling from his mind like a weed.

‘Oh, no, you know the one with the mice, this one didn’t have mice, this one had rats and it was a lot scarier, and I know what you’re thinking-’

‘I wish Larry would shut up and stop bothering me?’ He spoke through gritted teeth. Nobody heard him but Larry, and he was probably ignoring him anyway.

‘-You’re thinking, but Larry, how do you know the difference between a mouse, and a rat?’ There it was. ‘Well, the mice can tapdance, but the rats, oh, boy, they’re more modern freestyle, y’know?’

Even the daily ramble, which, weeks ago, would have made him roll his eyes and groan, was now warming him. How did he not notice until today that he had been struck so deep? This had been a master plan long in the making.

Even the daily ramble made his insides churn with affection.

Even what he’d previously considered the most annoying part of Larry was now endearing.

‘I have to,’ he spluttered, the words refusing to come out, ‘I have to, I have to go, and, eh, freshen – powder my – freshen up - back in a tick-!’

In the restroom, the ritual began. He splashed his face with water. He went over his hair, tucking each strand into place. Chemical lemon tastes filled his throat as he inhaled deeply. How he hated the stink of the school. Every corner was chalk or bleach or sweat or overpowering deodorants. It made him lightheaded. Breathing was impossible surrounded by these putrid teenagers and couldn’t-care-less teachers. Tolerating this life would be so much easier inside a bubble; a bubble in which no heroes or heartaches could reach him.

Which is when Larry’s affection became a torment.

He did it to everyone. He did it to _everyone._ Rippen repeated it mentally to himself until it became a mantra. _I’m not special. I’m not special. He does this to everyone._ But he wanted to be special. But he ached, raw from the realisation, for his attention. Like a starving man locking up and shutting down under refeeding, he was unused to being noticed, overshadowed and underwhelming, found it cumbersome, and here was Larry, prepared to lavish it upon him, prepared to shower him with stories and care.

He wanted to be special.

Dear god, he wanted to be special.

He would go to Larry on his knees and ask for the pinwheel story, the microwave loop for hours on end, to regale him with tales of Christmas trees and baby nickels. Only a day had passed since it had hit him – that what he felt for Larry, what had not long ago been a burning resentment, had turned into a blossoming warmth – and he was already bleeding humiliation from his every pore.

‘You doing okay in there?’

He turned sharply, in the middle of slapping himself, to see Larry. In fact, the moment Larry poked his head through the door of the men’s room, Rippen was hunched over the sink and his hand collided with a leather-skin smack against his face.

‘I’m fine, Larry,’ he snapped, ‘I’m fine. Don’t you have, I don’t know, timetables to alter?’

‘Oh _yeah!’_ He elongated the _yeah,_ eyes rolling back, one hand falling limp to swat the air. ‘I am just _all over_ the place today, Rip, must be because I woke up an hour earlier than usual, which is okay, like, becaaause, that’s an extra hour to get dressed, have a shave, tidy up, have breakfast, you can really relax, you know?’

‘No, Larry, I don’t.’

And Larry stopped.

Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined it, but Larry just stopped talking.

Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined that he’d want Larry to start again.

‘’Kay, I’ll see you later, then, see you later, handsome!’

Agonising, the conflict twisted inside of him. Larry left. It was almost beyond his restraint to not destroy the mirror and the pained mockery of his face. A look of sheer confusion, bewilderment, emotional turmoil, the corners of his mouth twitching, a Jekyll and Hyde caricature of his otherwise lordly composed self. Almost, however; his restraint, his composure, it was enough to pull himself from the mirror and drag him, still headachey and eyes stinging, to his classroom.

He spent most of his first hour slumped in a chair, his pose so reminiscent of the famous Thinker that some of the students had taken to sketching him as opposed to the ornate (plastic) vase their easels were circled around. Was he not the thinker? He was certainly thinking hard. Trying to make sense of anything, anything at all, just so he was not trapped in this endless torture.

Worse than the rack, worse than the thumbscrews, worse than breaking his bones or tickling his feet or locking him in an iron maiden; this most awful torture of all was the answer denied him, to the question that wouldn’t leave him be.

Rippen held his head in his hands, groaned. A number of students looked up.

What was wrong with him?


	3. Wednesday

It was Wednesday; Wednesday he knew that his chances were slim.

Tuesday night had been a welcome contrast to the sleeplessness of Monday. He’d departed from Fish Stick on a Stick early, it’d taken the do-gooders monochrome moments to defeat him in 20s Cartoon World, and as soon as he was home he fell asleep. He had plans – to wash away the day’s shame with a long, icy shower, to gorge himself on comfort foods until he felt nothing, to show Freddy his ideas for a new tattoo (a snake, or a bird?) – but as soon as he saw his bed it seduced him. It beckoned to him with its downy call. Minutes later, after the fastest shower he could remember having, he was asleep like a brick.

When he woke up, his mouth was coppery. His head was fuzzy. Were the past few days no more than a dream?

Glancing to the bedside table, he saw, rested upon a folded serviette, a segment of a tangerine.

His window was open, busted shutters fluttering in the morning breeze.

It was exhausting trying to work himself out. He hated Larry, hated his obnoxious chattering, his optimism, but the sickly sweetness inside him made him want to tear the sheets beneath him to shreds, thrash like an animal against these chains. He had built this cage around himself. He had denied it for too long. Arms trembling, he propped himself up, lightheaded from the blood swirling around his brain, forcing him to fall useless, powerless onto his back again.

This was love. Love, undeniable; love, indescribable; love, unexpected and inexplicable and, as always, in the strangest of places.

He imagined that the sudden weight constricting his lungs was Larry, sleeping peacefully upon him, on his front, head on his chest. He imagined that he could see the smaller man’s back rise and settle with every breath, see his lips move in mumbles as he dreamed. When Rippen opened his eyes and accepted that the weight was only that of his own disgust, the smile disappeared from his face and he felt himself choke up.

That’s what made him finally decide to roll out of bed, get dressed – his usual blue-grey shirts were all filthy with paint and sweat and fish stick grease stains, even though the work week was only halfway over, so he opted instead for a pale purple. He’d never worn it without a jacket, and it was too warm with Spring’s unpredictable miracles to wear one of those, but now he looked at himself in the mirror, it wasn’t half bad. Maybe paint stains would show up brighter, more garish on the subdued fabric, but just for today it’d do; he’d have to do a late laundry run after work. The shirt clung to his form, hugged him tighter. He looked good, even in a colour he hadn’t worn in years.

It was a much-needed ego boost, and the day only got better.

Well, it definitely got warmer. By lunch, his sleeves were rolled to his elbows. The students were marginally more competent than usual. One or two of them actually produced something of worth. And pestering by Larry was minimal – even in the car ride to Fish Stick on a Stick, he was almost silent, aside from peppered comments on his day. That wasn’t so much of an improvement as a flint striking Rippen’s heart and causing guilt to ignite in his soul.

Larry _hadn’t._ Larry _wouldn’t._ Would he? Had he? Had Larry finally taken Rippen’s disinterest to heart? Would he never speak again? The thought was a horror. Earlier, weeks, months, it’d be a dream, but now he was fond of it, it was not a promise but a threat.

He looked down at Larry in the passenger seat. Fidgeting, staring out of the window, gasping only-audibly when he saw a dog or a plant he liked but noticeably restraining himself from pointing them out to Rippen. He thought he was doing good, Rippen thought, but no, he was only twisting the knife and it wasn’t his fault. Such innocence. Such unspoilt optimism. So _pure –_ he didn’t mean an ounce of cruelty to a single soul.

Did he?

He couldn’t . In one burst of epiphany, of light, Larry had become this harmless, tormentous thing warming Rippen’s heart like the sun. Scalding him alive.

‘Larry?’ He called out, hating the pleading in his voice. ‘Are you- feeling alright?’

‘Yeah, yeah, no, I’m fine, I’m fine.’

Clearly absent, he stared out of the window, and Rippen drove in silence. It took him extreme courage, extreme cunning, to slowly move his hand – move it down – and place it on Larry’s hand, on the passenger seat. Larry’s hands were so small. His fingers were so short and stubby, fitting for such a small man, and Rippen’s taloned hands dwarfed them, enveloped them completely.

Until Larry drew his hand away, not so much snatching them as gently withdrawing.

‘Both hands on the wheel, sweetie.’

‘Yes, right, of course.’

They pulled up to Fish Stick on a Stick in silence. Overhead, Phil watched them like a vulture, a wordless disapproving statue standing by the controls with his lips drawn tight. Almost mistaking him _for_ a statue, Rippen exhaled only when he saw Phil blink slowly, fingers drumming the lever.

‘What? You boys aren’t talking to each other now? You have a falling out?’

_‘Yes,_ I mean, _no,’_ Rippen stumbled over his words, pouring them out before he could structure them sensibly. ‘I _mean,_ it’s just a-’

Halfway through a coherent sentence, he was in the air, Phil pulling the lever down swiftly and with colossal impatience.

‘No time for talking, bad luck, see you later!’

And, _whoosh,_ they were gone. Rippen picked himself up, dusted himself down, and turned to ask Larry for the mission brief only to find him already checking. He didn’t need Rippen’s signal to begin; maybe he was having revelations of his own. The sudden realisation – the one that hurt his head and chest to think about - had slapped Rippen in the face and its print was still red raw on his skin.

This place was a dump, though. Dreary, drab, red-rocked. A ladder of light descended from silver clouds to a too-obvious mountain in the distance. The light barely touched his cloven hooves in the shadow of the cave’s mouth. Larry withdrew the hologram and tented his fingers.

‘So, we’re little devils,’ Larry began, and demonstrated a little shake of his forked tail, ‘And we need to head on up to the mountain-’ He indicated it with a clawed finger, ‘-Because the elder angel is sick. Ohhh, poor guy!’

‘Never believed in angels,’ Rippen grumbled, folding his arms (spikes all the way up his forearms; all the way down his back; cresting his devilish head), glancing sideways to see if Larry had reacted in the slightest. He hadn’t.

‘Anyway, we need to get up there so we can possess him while he’s weak, so we can rule the over-world, underworld _and_ heaven. And we need to get there before the priests do, or they’ll cure him and he’ll be strong enough to beat us both silly. Sounds simple enough!’

Turning, tail curling behind him, he began for the cave’s exit. Rippen hesitated, then called for him, reaching out a hand. Larry was only inches from his reach but god, it was enough to feel like a million miles between them.

‘Larry?’

‘Yes, sugar?’

So sweet. Such a sweet man. He was too good to be true. Rippen wrung his hands, chewing the inside of his mouth.

‘Are you... mad at me?’

He smiled sheepishly, too wide, and Larry shrugged. ‘No. Why?’

He was _lying._ Too innocent. Too wide-eyed. Did he glance down and to the left? Rippen could swear he heard sarcasm. Or he was just afraid, just paranoid; the shock of falling in love so fast (was love at second glance a thing?) had left him vulnerable to the shock of losing Larry as even a friend. Before, he was fed up with Larry’s nonsense, but now he was starving, and didn’t know how wonderful it was until it seemed to be running out.

‘Nothing!’ It came out squeaky. ‘Nothing.’ That wasn’t much better.

It wasn’t long before they ran into Penn and his meddlesome mob. It wasn’t long after that before the aforementioned do-gooders sent them packing. They were so _close_ this time. It was something Rippen had told himself so many times before, and it was getting less encouraging. It wasn’t the first time he’d had a teenager in a dress steal victory away from him, and certainly wasn’t the first time he’d been beaten up by a priest, but that did not ease the humiliation of defeat.

But the elder angel – fifty feet of radiance and splendour – was cured. Holy water from a blessed chalice, poured onto his immense forehead, had filled him with the glowing strength to kick Rippen to kingdom come. Curiously, Larry was unharmed, following suit of his own accord. Larry, the heavensent. Larry, who would follow him to the depths of hell.

In a red flash, Rippen reached for Larry’s hand but could not find it. When he was released by the scarlet pull, he despised how foolish he must have looked. Hunched over, jaw slack, eyes hunting for his inferior in the light, one hand grasping at air, grasping for life. Larry turned, face illuminated by the glow of machinery, and he _did_ look angelic.

Rippen had to set things right. It was not natural to him, but he had to make things better.

‘Larry.’

Larry stared at him, eyes like saucers, mouth drawn into a smile so charming it was like plastic. He didn’t speak for a nerve-wracking half-second.

‘Yes?’

Alright. Now. Rippen hissed through his teeth. He straightened his back.

‘Would you, like to, I mean, if you don’t have anything better to do...’ His mouth drained. Swallowing was like trying to ingest a snooker ball. Larry’s expression didn’t change. He was a perpetually-smiling mannequin. That smile, once infernal, was making his knees tremble. He couldn’t do this. He had to. The sounds of the building were crushing him; the whirr and hum of machinery, the groan of the building, the crunching of the old man in the corner, Phil’s impatient coughing, it was filling his head and stifling him.

Since when were emotions so complicated?

Since when was Larry the only sensible thing in his life?

‘Do you want to go on a date with me?’

The words fell out of his mouth too quickly and he had to stumble to pick them up again.

‘I mean, a coffee date. I mean, do you want to get coffee after work. Tomorrow.’

Larry’s eyes lit up like moons and he gasped. The world made sense again. It had been hidden for so long, a riddle outside his grasp, but now he knew. The world, the meaning of it, was right here in front of him. In front of him was joy, was hope, was kindness and love unlimited. Larry meant the world to him, and it took him this long to realise.

‘Oh, I’d love to!’ Larry clasped his hands together. ‘This time tomorrow. Oh, there’s this adorable little coffee shop opened just downtown, reminds me of when I was a teen, I used to go to this place with my buddies, and we’d hang out by the door and look tough, like in the movies, so one day we went to the movies...’

Rippen listened intently. He drove slower, found himself engaged in Larry’s stories. Once more, once more since he sold his soul to villainy and lost all interest in those around him, since fleeting encounters and sudden shocks and boundless rage were all that stirred emotion within him, he found himself staring fondly at Larry, so _wonderful,_ so full of _words,_ before sharply swerving to stay on the road.

‘Oh, that was a close one!’ Larry seemed unsurprised, but Rippen was shaken. His nerves, this job was no good for his nerves, he needed a day off. The weekend was only two days away...

‘Can I ask you something, old chum?’ he asked, eyes locked on the road, on the streetlights glittering golden in puddles of spring rain.

‘Of course!’ Larry crossed his legs, looking up at Rippen, eyes keen and smile willing and everything, everything in him making Rippen feel warm and shaky and stupid and glad. That smile was a weapon. So dastardly, a poison that’d been dripping into him from the day they’d met. So devious, a weapon so concealed that not even the user knew of the turmoil it was wreaking.

‘I know I asked this earlier, but are you _really_ not mad at me?’ Before Larry could reply, he stammered in addition, ‘You’ve just been so quiet today, I was worried- about- you.’

The words wouldn’t leave his mouth without him spitting them out. Anxiously, he chewed his lower lip in anticipation for Larry’s reply. The other man smiled softly, tenderly, and Rippen had to pull his eyes away. If not, he’d have become lost in his face, lost in all the kindness there, and then they’d both be lost in the headlights of oncoming traffic, dangerous however sparse.

‘Of course not, Rippen, I could never be mad at you.’ And this time his words were sincere. ‘I just want to be the best bad bad guy I can be.’

‘I’m not sure I could follow that. What do you mean?’

Larry sat back in his seat. ‘You always say you don’t have time to hear my stories, so I figured, y’know, I don’t want to spoil your fun.’ He wrung his hands. ‘I want to be the best I can be for you. I wasn’t lying when I said that this is what I live for.’

‘When did you say that? I don’t remember you saying that.’

‘That doesn’t _matter._ What matters is, it’s true.’

Rippen stopped outside the gates of Larry Manor, the not-quite-sunset purpling the sky. Now he could get a good look at Larry, and it was truly a treat to do so. His heart stilled in his chest, released from the villainous vice. All that he saw was kindness, gentleness, and warmth; sympathy, tenderness, and love; he was in love with Larry and all of the goodness inside of him. He couldn’t ask for a better bad bad guy, not in a million years.

Larry took Rippen’s hand and clasped it tightly. Rippen felt his lower lip tremble. This was the most un-evil thing he had ever experienced and it was delectable.

‘I know I can’t be the best bad guy,’ Larry said, softly but smiling, ‘But I can be whatever you need. I can change for you, Rippen.’

Rippen’s heart shattered. He hadn’t thought it, but now he knew, he didn’t want Larry to change. Was he so domineering, so controlling, so perpetually dissatisfied that Larry would wish to change? Larry, who seemed to love himself, his life, now willing to change for a beast such as him?

God, he felt like scum.

‘Larry, no.’ Rippen ran his other hand through his hair. ‘As much as it pains me to say this, I don’t want you to stop telling me your stories. Ever. Please.’

Larry nodded, squinting through his smile as if it were the only thing holding a spluttering dam of tears together. He ran his thumb over Rippen’s knuckles, raised the hand slightly as if to bring it to his lips, and then let go. The warmth flooded from Rippen’s body.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow at work, sweetie!’

He was out of the car, Rippen’s hand elevated in an awkward wave. Larry disappeared up the lane to his home, and Rippen found himself waiting, watching for the butler to open the door and let her master into the safety and warmth of Larry Manor.

Then he found himself waiting longer, staring up at the house with longing and need, staring at the amber lights of caution glowing in the distant windows. More precious than any jewel. More terrifying than the eyes of any beast. Inciting more envy, more guilt in him than any wreckage or reward. He reached for the suns in the windows, found himself grasping at nothing. He found himself wishing, then lost himself in the bitterness and bewilderment; he withdrew his reaching hand, closed the car door, and rested his forehead on the wheel, the ensuing beep heard by no-one at all.

The lavender shirt was suddenly unflatteringly tight. Remembering the laundry in the back seat, he tore himself away from that dream-and-light castle in the clouds in which his talkative prince laid his head, and began the drive to the laundromat. His chances were slim - but not nonexistent.


	4. Thursday

It was Thursday; Thursday, glorious; Thursday, marvellous; Thursday, the day that Rippen had planned pedantically while watching his laundry rumble around the machine in a whirlpool of pinstripe blue. Thursday, devious; the day he would confess his feelings for Larry, and Larry would surely reciprocate, and it would all go according to plan.

It was not going according to plan.

It was going terribly.

The day had left him short on patience, to say the least. It had left him with many things – paint, mostly acrylic, a little gouache, halfway up his arm after inadvertently leaning on his still-wet canvas; a headache like a kick drum; there were aches and pains all over his body. As the saying goes, when a man lies with dogs he rises with fleas, likewise Rippen had spent the day surrounded by pains in the neck, sights for sore eyes, headaches of the highest order, and that was what he had acquired. Shattered as he had been, he almost forgot about his date – not a _date,_ a _meeting,_ a calculated arrangement – with the principal after work, and had only remembered when he saw Larry pass the classroom, waving at him more gaily than usual, cheeks rosying.

He couldn’t cancel these plans just because he had a bad day. Maybe today’s villainy would make up for it. At least he wasn’t poor Vlurgen. He found it hard to feel sorry for her, only glad for himself, when he discovered that his dear sister had been arranged, unhappily and very much against her will, to marry a villainous emperor. Maybe life wasn’t so sweet up there, so high in his parents’ esteem.

He had to bite the bullet and be on his best behaviour. Larry had done it before – made all the pain go away – so maybe he could do it again tonight, after Rippen confessed.

Maybe this would finally be the moment. They’d see eye to eye. They’d communicate better. Maybe the ripple caused by this particular rock in the water would be larger than he first thought.

He had also underestimated the mission.

Okay. Dog world. It didn’t sound too difficult, but when he came face to face with his form – he would have accepted any kind of collie, bulldog or bloodhound, but a corgi? – he came face to face, too, with his defeat. Stubby legs, with a size disadvantage weighing on him like iron shackles, and Larry bounding about after birds and leaves and balls in the whimsical way of a chocolate Labrador, while the mission – he barely knew what the mission _was,_ Larry’d bounded into a river after a ball and came out without his glasses – was won by the heroes.

So, understandably, after exiting that awful dimension, he had to rest his head against a greasy wall and groan for a moment or two, while Phil stared silently, ironing his bowling shirt, and Larry ran a lint roller over his vest to collect the stray furs that had come through the portal with him.

‘You alright, big guy?’ he called out, looking up from his shirt. Then, in a sing-song tone, ‘Ready for our da-ate?”

Seconds passed in silence and Rippen gathered his wits. He pulled on a false grin and turned to Larry, stepping forward and offering him his arm.

‘Shall we, my dear?’

Tenderly, Larry took him by the arm and the two men exited the building, content to walk to the coffee shop in the unpredictably clement weather. Watching them go, Phil shook his head, then continued to smooth the wrinkles out of the long-neglected garment, reminiscence creasing his bitter, lonesome face.

‘I have been _so_ looking forward to this,’ Larry said, walking briskly to keep up with Rippen’s long strides, holding onto his arm, ‘I have been just _aching_ to spend more time with you, y’know? And usually, we’re both so busy with work, and evil, we just don’t hang out any more – you know what I mean?’

‘Yes, Larry, I know exactly what you mean.’ But he didn’t, really, his mind was elsewhere. He was miles away. Thinking about how to get back at Penn Zero; thinking about how to confess to Larry. His mind was occupied. He would’ve walked straight past the coffee shop, if Larry hadn’t tugged at his arm, swatted him playfully, and guided him in.

The place was cosy. First, there were the plants, tall green leafy efforts in pots either side of the door and lining the windowsills, with assortments of pink and gold flowers, mostly carnations but also vivid chrysanthemums, in glass vases and clay pots decorated with pink ribbons . Then the décor: polka-dotted tablecloths and seat cushions; wooden panelling and furniture still new and shining, unspotted, as with older tables, by the rings of cups. In the air, the scent of caffeine was thick and mingled with that of baked goods.

Inside, the people were sparse, the place was not yet well known enough to be bustling and packed with customers, and Rippen welcomed the half-privacy. People peppered the polka-dotted tables, some chatting, one or two on their phones or reading books, and Larry guided Rippen to the counter, as if teaching him a caffeinated waltz. One coffee (black, no sugar), one tea (milky, sweetened), and a table by the window where they could watch the pleasant afternoon turn into a rainy evening.

_Now._ Now Rippen could make his confession. Fear twisted his stomach. Rejection. Repulsion. Now was the moment and it was his to seize. Now was the moment – of his victory, of his defeat, the moment that would change his relationship with Larry for good, for better or for worse, the moment he’d been waiting for, unknowingly, from zap one to today-

This moment, or the next, or the next, or the moment Larry _finally_ let him speak.

‘And I’d just heard this place had opened, so I was like, hey, why not! And I’ve heard so many good things about this from my book club, oh, did I tell you about my book club?’

‘Larry.’

‘There’s this woman, Sandy, she always brings the nicest little teacakes.’

‘Larry.’

‘And one day, one day, you won’t believe this, she uses soap powder instead of sugar! Oh, I tell her, Sandy, there’s something wrong with these-’

_‘Larry.’_

‘-And she says, those are decorative soaps, this isn’t a book club, my name’s Nigel and you’re getting suds all over the fresh linen! So I tell him...’

Larry laughed and Rippen seethed. When would he be quiet? When would he let him confess? He had to know he was doing this. This had to be a trick of his. Innocent Larry, not so innocent at all. It was infuriating. Rippen drummed his fingers on the table, waiting in vain for this story to go somewhere. He sipped his coffee. Larry was still talking.

Any moment now.

Any moment now.

Any moment longer, and he’d burst. If one sin ran in his family, and there were several, it was impatience, glorious and restless and vast.

A confession, and it was to be beautiful, and it was _not_ to be waited for any longer. Rippen erupted with impatient rage, slamming one hand on the table.

‘Larry, will you _shut up_ for a _second,_ I’ve been trying to get a word in edgeways for the past ten minutes- do you _ever_ stop talking rubbish?!’

And he immediately felt the need, the twitch in his elbow, the urge to clasp a hand over his mouth and be still, be soft, be quiet. He didn’t mean it to come out so harsh, but he did not know how to make it any other way.

Larry was silent, too, and so was the café. Two people were staring; the others were trying not to. The woman behind the counter was on alert, ready to ask them to leave if the occasion arose. Upon Larry’s face was a smile. It was _horrible._ An awful, trembling smile, turning into a grimace with gritted teeth, lips curling into a snarl, biting back tears as his forehead creased with misery.

‘I’m sorry, Rippen,’ he managed, and then again, ‘I’m sorry.’

His hands, so delicate, so small, curled into fists on the table as he hunched over and tried to hide his face. He’d been so stupid. He’d been so foolish. All of his life, all of his time spent so kindly, all of his optimism gone to waste trying to change for this selfish thing.

Rippen, on the other hand but not a hand completely different, desperately grasped for the occasion, trying to resuscitate it but finding it dying, spluttering, flatlining, dead.

‘No, Larry, I didn’t mean to say that.’ _But I did,_ but he didn’t say that, _I just wanted to say something._ ‘I just meant, I wanted to- I was only trying to- tell you something-!’

Larry turned to look at him, sharp, uncharacteristically snappy, face contorted with distress, almost unrecognisable from the heaving frown and tearful eyes. ‘What?’

His voice had a crack in it. A cleft, a ravine, deep and endless. Rippen lost his footing and fell straight into it. In the face of this man, a face he loved so dearly he could not describe nor fathom it, he had no idea what to say.

‘Good,’ Larry said, softer, voice still quivering, ‘Because I don’t care.’ A sob, stifled by his hand over his mouth. This, Rippen realised, had been waiting a long time. He was not the only one stifling his emotions. How long had Larry felt like this? How long had these tears waited to fall? ‘I don’t care!’

‘Larry...’ Rippen said, but not in impatience. He reached out a hand, only to withdraw it before he could touch Larry’s arm, as if he were radiant, burning, untouchable, unthinkable _._

‘You never-’ Larry heaved a breath, glancing at his hand, clawing at air, trying to squeeze an epiphany out of the redolence of coffee and confusion like a diamond out of coal. ‘You never listen to me! You never- treat me like I’m anything but a nuisance to you, like all I do is get in your way, and I _try,_ don’t you think I _try?’_

‘Larry, I know you try, just listen-’

‘No!’ And now everyone was looking, out of the corners of their eyes or over their books. ‘No, I’m done listening to you, you’d better listen to me for once in your life!’ For once he was silent, as if he didn’t know what to do with Rippen’s attention now that he had it.

With a sigh, his voice lowered, and he put his hands together, staring into his laced fingers.

‘When we first started working together, I saw a lonely guy who needed a friend. And I try to see the good in you – I know there’s good in everything, in you, in Phil, in Belvedere – but you’re just so – self centered, sometimes!’ He fumbled with an imaginary ring on his little finger, refusing to meet Rippen’s gaze, ashamed of himself. ‘I let you treat me like dirt. I don’t like that. I don’t like how you don’t care about anyone but yourself!’

Rippen opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Guilt was twisting him into a monster, just as humiliation was transforming Larry, and now, the two men in the café, at the polka-dot table by the rain-slicked window, might as well have been strangers, as neither recognised the other in these new, foreign garments of agony and sorrow.

‘I know, I’m, like, your minion, and I know, it’s not my place to ask, but, would it kill you to treat me with a little respect? It’s almost like you... don’t really like me at all. Like you hate me. I don’t like to let you know I notice, because I don’t want you to feel bad, but- but-’ _But you deserve it._ He didn’t say that either, but it was his silence, his unmoving, open lips.

Larry stared into his empty cup for a second, then laughed, briefly, brokenly, sharply enough to make Rippen flinch. To hurt Larry in this way, to make him think this way, it broke his heart, broke his spirit, tore through him like disease.

‘I can’t believe I was a little bit in love with you.’

And that was what stilled Rippen’s spinning head (he might've known, he could've guessed), what made him feel stuck and sick and dirty, what winded him like a punch in the stomach and now he couldn’t move, he was paralysed, bound by those confounded chains of his own confusion that did not let him free until Larry had already paid, had already left, and Rippen, watched by the judging eyes of those gargoyles on their spotted perches, stumbled after him with a broken chest and drunken, uncooperative legs. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_ man.

He cried out, shouted his name into the rain, but he was gone. Dazed, Rippen almost fell to his knees in the café doorway, rain soaking his face, his hair, his chest, the warm spring downpour creeping down his collar, down his spine. This could have gone so well but he’d thrown it all away, and now he knew Larry had – had _once_ – loved him back, it did not make him feel any better; it made him feel like scum.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohhh, boy, sorry for the delay, guys, life's been hectic. Hope you enjoyed this happy chapter! (Happy chappy, hapter chapter)


	5. Friday

It was Friday.

Rippen had not slept. People were noticing. He was sickly pale and unwashed. His shirt was creased unflatteringly, having not been pressed. At irregular intervals, his stomach would growl. He would eat, but his appetite was elsewhere. More than once, he drifted off during class, and would awaken with paint on his face. Whether it was from his canvas or the students taking advantage of his fluctuating consciousness, he did not care. He felt like dirt.

More than that, he felt sorry for himself. He still felt anger, as if Larry had pushed him to this, but he could not expel it from his heart. He had not scolded anyone the whole day. His heart was too full to speak, and the concerned looks and arm-touches from his fellow teachers were met only with grunts as he supervised, absentmindedly, his class. They were quickly becoming unruly. With their teacher unresponsive to their chaos, they were free to reign in a tumultuous ochlocracy. He had not lectured them on not leaving the paint brushes in their water pots, or sharpening their pencils to lethal points, or leaving coloured pencils and pastels in the order of the rainbow. All colour had left him and the whole world was grey.

At one point – after a lunch break that consisted of a few sips of coffee and largely neglecting the packed lunch he’d thrown together – he fell into a mumbling, restless sleep at his desk. It was brief, but during the few minutes he spent asleep a dream occurred to him – recurred, as he had had it before, though not lately – a dream in which he was stranded in an endless field of burning wheat, charred stalks blazing noiselessly and rising in plumes of smoke, ladders of flame to the cloudless heavens. In this purgatory, roaring with a wind he could not feel against his skin, he wandered aimlessly in circles, following a voice crying his name against the gale, lost as the orange sky turned to slate above him, smoke circling like indigo-feathered hawks until he woke with a start.

Penn Zero put away his paintbrush, trying to act like he was not in the middle of painting a pair of glasses on his teacher’s face (which was now a smudged monocle), and now he leaned on his elbows on the desk, smiling.

‘Penny for your thoughts, sleepyhead?’

Rippen pushed himself away from the desk, stretching his neck. God, he ached all over, all over and inside.

‘I don’t need your sympathy.’ He wiped his mouth on his sleeve. ‘Stop bothering me.’

‘Jeez, I didn’t mean to wake the sleeping beauty, I just thought you looked a little...’

Clownlike, Penn frowned, moving a fingertip down his cheek to indicate a teardrop. If he wasn’t here, wasn’t now, Rippen would’ve strangled him. This mockery was unbearable. He was about to order him back to his easel and take control of this class out of spite, but then Larry walked past the door.

He glanced at Rippen, for no more than a second, and then walked on, and Rippen fell back into his seat, all the energy blown from his body. The red-headed devil’s eyes widened knowingly.

‘Oh,’ he gasped, then, grinning, ‘ _Oh!_ Did you and Principal Larry have a falling out, Old Rip?’

‘Leave me alone.’ Rippen shuffled a stack of papers, pretending to read them, anything to ignore this insufferable wretch. ‘Be quiet. You’re not needed, boy.’

‘Are you sure you don’t need a little, mmm, matchmaker magic to put you and Captain Sunshine back on the Happy Train to Best Friendsville?’

Rippen was sorting the papers into two piles. Neither pile had any significance; it was only a pointless, repetitive action he could perform until Penn went away.

‘I don’t need your help.’

‘C’mon, the train is leaving the station!’ His friend – the one with the _nose –_ was chuffing behind him, pulling an imaginary train whistle and hooting.

‘I lost my ticket, thank you, good day.’

‘All I’m saying is, I could pull a few strings, get you a-’

Rippen boiled over. The papers fell from his hands. He stood upright. His shoulders rolled back. His jaw trembled with the tension of his teeth. This, the picture of rage, statuesque and broad, was the most alert anyone had seen him all day. One finger, like that of a vengeful god, extended and pointed to the empty easel on the other side of the room.

‘Penn _Zero,’_ Rippen roared, watching the boy flinch slightly but _visibly_ beneath his presence, ‘Get _back_ to your seat and _stop_ bothering me or I will _carry_ you there by the _scruff_ of your neck!’

The chatter disappeared. All the students fell hush and began working. The click of Larry’s shoes down the corridor stopped, then resumed, and as Penn retreated to his seat – scolded, a little indignant, he knew when he wasn’t needed – Rippen was certain that Larry was not coming back to check.

A soft murmur rose when he sank into his seat again, but it dissipated into silence when he slammed his hand on the table and barked _‘Quiet!’._ Everything was grey again, everything was still, and all he could do was pace around the classroom, circling wordlessly, watching the students like a vulture circling small, wounded creatures that flinched away from his eyes.

The day was out. He sprinted from the building, gone before the bell’d finished its final chime, shot into his car and waited eagerly for Larry to join him. The sight of him was bizarre. He looked like a large Labrador waiting for its master; had he a tail, it’d be thrashing in anticipation. Larry stepped out of the school, a leather-elbowed jacket slung over his arm (it was warm, but not warm enough to dare go out without a coat in case of a shower). He trotted down the steps, stopped a few steps away from Rippen’s car, and stared at him.

Internally, Larry was debating whether to approach or not. He was raw. He was hurt. Expelling all that bottled up emotion had left him empty. What would he even say? Would he explain his misery, apologise to Rippen, or solidify his anger, which was dissolving even now? He wasn’t angry, not at all; he was resentful, bitter that he’d allowed himself to be treated in such a way, and he wasn’t ready, not yet, to forgive Rippen, not until he knew he was sorry.

So he turned away, and Rippen broke a little more. He was sorry. He’d cry it from the rooftops; crawl to him like a sinner before god if it meant his forgiveness, but his pride would not allow him. All he could do was raise a hand in a half-beckoning, half-hearted wave and buckle up, ready for work. He’d see Larry there, anyway, and then they could work something out. By the end of the day, he was sure, everything would be perfect, everything would get worked out, and in the end it always was.

Always. He hoped so.

He arrived to Fish Stick on a Stick later than usual; there was no race, the thrill of planning his next move once the car stopped was not there, as there was no Larry to beat him to it. This was not a game for one person. When he arrived, he did not see Larry, only Phil, who was cutting peppers with a broad knife, placing each one gingerly on a tall sandwich of various fillings. He was interrupted from his mosaic when Rippen let the door fall shut behind him, looking around.

‘Phil, you smell great,’ he started, to get the man’s attention, ‘Question, is Larry anywhere here? He didn’t- pop to the little minion’s room? Will he be here soon?’

Phil closed the sandwich and, producing a welding torch, began to gently toast it.

‘Your friend is not here. He phoned in this morning, said he was not coming in today. I say, fate of multiverse, fighting do-gooders, defending evil, but he said he was ‘going through some heavy stuff’, so I let him have day off.’

‘Oh,’ Rippen whispered, and then, softer, ‘Larry, oh, Larry, what have I done?’

Pitifully, he clasped his hands over his face, and Phil could not bear to watch. Normally he’d keep out of the villains’ lives, he could not afford to get to know them when every mission was fraught with danger and these two had survived so far on dumb luck alone. But he could not let Rippen, the once-tremendous villain, the one who’d banished the Zero duo to the Most Dangerous World Imaginable, sit around and feel sorry for himself any longer. He put the torch down and leant forwards against the counter.

‘So you and your short friend had a falling out.’ He beckoned with a calloused hand. ‘Come over here and talk about it with Phil, like manly man friends. Bros. We are bros, Rippen, tell your bro what you are feeling.’

Hesitating for but a heartbeat, Rippen pulled up a chair and sat down by the counter, leaning on the greasy top. Here the confession began; here he could lay his feelings bare to the man who lent a listening ear despite seeming, always, like a statue whose indifferent eyes bore down on him from this seafood-scented Notre Dame de Middleburg.

‘I hurt his feelings. I wouldn’t listen to him, and it’s all my fault, but I didn’t mean to hurt him that much! We were in that new coffee shop, the one with the chrysanthemums-’

‘You shout at him, he cries and runs away. I heard.’

‘You- you _knew?!_ Did he tell you?!’ _Filth, filth, filth,_ Rippen felt like filth.

‘No, I hear about it from Middleburg Gossip blog. I follow it very closely.’ Under the desk, he peered at his phone, scrolling briefly through a page of the blog – _Old Man Middleburg arrested for dog theft; public indecency; resisting arrest, insists that it is all a misunderstanding and also his birthday –_ and gestured for Rippen to continue.

‘I’m evil, aren’t I?’

‘Of course you are.’ Phil added, quietly, ‘Not full-time evil, but sure, evil is evil.’

‘I’m evil. I do bad things. Horrid, awful, grisly things.’ He grimaced, mouth drying up, eyes wide with horror. ‘But not to Larry. Dear god, never to Larry. He’s so incompetent, he’s- innocent, naïve, he rots my teeth, he makes me feel so confused, I’m _never_ confused! I’m clever, Phil, I’m cunning, I’m a master of riddles and deceit, but Larry, he just- he baffles me in the strangest of ways, and...’

He trailed off, hands circling in mid-air as he fought for words. Phil, staring at him, blinked and said;

‘Rippen.’

Rippen looked up.

‘Are you in love with him.’

It was barely a question. After a puppy-eyed pause, Rippen felt his stomach quiver, his heart flutter and beat fast, his blood buzz and bubble.

‘Yes.’ Silence. His lip trembled. He fell apart. ‘Oh, _god,_ I’m in love with him, Phil, I’m in love with him, I’m so in love with him, I don’t know what to do, I love him so much, I love him, I love him, I love him-!’

Rippen collapsed onto the counter before him, causing Phil to draw back. Every denial, every excuse. Nothing but ribbons. Now expelled, the thoughts could not eat him anymore. Phil listened to him repeating it like a mantra. It was as if every time those words had occurred to Rippen, and subsequently been pushed down like a thought of abhorrent violence, they were now spilling out of him – every time he’d wanted to say it, every time he thought it but could not believe it, every time he’d denied it, it was now flooding from him and he would never be finished.

‘There, there,’ Phil said, in an uncomforting monotone, ‘Now you get it out of your system, you feel better, like eating a bad fish stick. Question is, what do you do now?’

Wiping his eyes, Rippen stuttered for an answer. ‘I don’t know.’ Those words were foreign, venomous in his mouth. ‘I can’t apologise to him, I c- I can’t, he’ll never take me back, and it’s- it’s beyond saving now, there’s nothing I can do. I’ve been an idiot. I can’t admit to that. I can still leave this with my pride.’

‘Nonsense. It is not too late to apologise, you are only afraid of saying you were wrong.’ Shrugging, Phil rolled a piece of pepper between his fingers. ‘Listen to me, Rippen.’ The name rolled off his tongue delightfully – _Rip-_ pin, the R vibrating through his teeth.

It took Rippen a moment to gather himself and listen. Phil looked him in the eyes – those tearful, beaten-wolf eyes – and felt things (remorse; sympathy; a warm, odd compassion) that he thought had been torn from him years ago.

‘If you are finding it hard to speak, it is because your mouth is full,’ he said, choosing his words slowly and deliberately, ‘And you must swallow your pride. Leave pride behind. You love him, you love him truly, you will not be afraid to be vulnerable and soft in front of him, like animal showing submission to superior by baring the weak, tender belly.’

Rippen stared at him for a moment, searching his face, and he did not find the usual stony-faced apathy but a new, tender Phil; a Phil that may have existed many years ago, gentle and tender even when villainous, and he felt a oneness with the man he saw because he knew that he, too, had once been capable of love.

After the moment passed, Rippen could not hold himself back, and flung his arms around the smaller man’s shoulders, holding him tightly.

‘Thank you,’ he blubbered, inelegant, ‘Thank you so much, I’ll always be grateful to you, I promise, it’s my word as a villain!’

Rigid, Phil patted Rippen on the back, and felt pangs of guilt, longing, shadows of things long gone. He suppressed them.

‘Villain’s word does not mean very much.’

Breathless, wordless, Rippen laughed, pulling away, and Phil cupped his face in both hands, holding him at eye level, pinning his attention.

‘I will call Phyllis, tell her that heroes get this one. You go tomorrow, first thing you can, and tell little man how you feel. Understand?’

Rippen nodded. Tears were budding in his eyes. The stone-faced Phil returned, and he said in an almost-sarcastic monotone-

‘Do not cry. You cry, I cry. You do not want to see Phil cry.’

‘No, no, no,’ Rippen shook his head, blinking, ‘You have pepper on your hands. It stings.’ He laughed, wheezing, ‘A lot.’

Sighing, smiling (so rare, a jewel, a string of pearls in those thin, worn lips), Phil let go of his face and patted him on the back.

‘Get out of here. Get rested. I wish you luck!’

As Rippen left, running to his car with a newfound vigor, Phil went to his phone.

‘Phyllis? Is Phil.’

‘You are late,’ the woman replied, ‘My heroes start mission half an hour ago, where is your, how do I say, dimwit duo?’

‘Ha ha, very funny, my sides are splitting.’ Phil massaged his forehead. ‘Listen, they cannot come to mission today. You win this one. Take easy mission.’

Doubtful, Phyllis hesitated. ‘What is wrong with Rippen and Larry? They are sick?’

Phil glanced out of the window. A lovesick Rippen was driving home, ready to clean and brush and preen himself for tomorrow’s events, as if this were the final night of the life he’d known, as if tomorrow was rapture, Armageddon, heaven-sent and hell-bound.

‘Mmm,’ Phil shrugged, ‘You could say that, yes.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter (hapter chapter) was fun! I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Writing this weirdly vague who-hurt-you Phil is fun. Like, more fun than it ought to be. I live for Phyllis or Phil angst.  
> Regardless, I'm loving the reactions the last chapter got! I hope this one makes up for it.


	6. Saturday

It was Saturday, but do not forget, it was Saturday for Larry as well. The day was one well spent. He had been well rested, having gone to bed earlier the previous day – as there had been less to write about in his diary - and today he’d had the energy to visit the park, shop for a new sweater, tidy his home and roam the gardens. Although the butlers had offered their help, he was comfortable to share his time only with Tony, and even that adorable scamp was given an early bedtime. When Tony was tucked in and snoozing, Larry paced the garden in the pattering rain, weaving through the shadows of statues and topiaries.

The sky was turning purple with the sunset and gloomy with clouds. Was purple not the colour of loneliness? Or was it that of wealth? Did it represent all that he had gained or what he had so recently lost? Was it the colour of innovations, lilac inventions, answers to questions in the vast shreds of cloudscape above him? Rain was now soaking his clothes and when he blinked a drop from his eyelashes the sky was no longer purple. It was red and it was darkening, and so he headed inside.

The butlers offered him dry clothing and after he accepted he dismissed them, though not ungratefully. Both of them loved their master, and so their work, and did as he said but they could not help but exchange worried looks when he insisted that tonight, he wished to be alone.

It was a lie. He wanted Rippen by his side but hated his guts. When would he apologise? He so wanted to run back to him and fall into his arms but what good would that do? It would only teach Rippen that his Number 2 was weak, was pliable, would do anything he pleased. Even if he loved Rippen – even if Rippen did not love him back – he would prove to that green-skinned goblin that he was his own person; that he would not bow to his every whim; that he was the only unconquerable thing in this world.

Even if it destroyed him. Even if this love went starving forever. He had waited so long, making himself everything he thought Rippen would want, that he neglected what he, himself, needed.

As his clothes were sticking to him, he peeled away his damp trousers and shrugged off the damp shirt, kicked the wet socks into a corner and changed into dry pyjamas, lilac and soft against his skin. He threw a dressing gown over himself, the night had turned cold fast; the garment was a rich tyrian purple, sweeping around his feet, his first initial curled against his left breast in gold.

It was 10PM when he drew his curtains, having grown tired of seeing the rain slide down the windowpane, and he rolled into bed, pulling the covers over himself, and, for a while, he slept dreamlessly. He tossed, he turned. He thrashed. He could not get comfortable. His sleep was a restless one. He could not sleep until his mind, too, was at rest, but how could that be, when he was so sure Rippen was not sorry for what he’d done?

‘Larry!’

He was startled from the darkness behind his eyelids by a yell, then riotous shouting, the thunder of his butlers at the front door ordering the miscreant from the doorstep. Climbing from bed, he pulled his slippers onto his feet, nudged the glasses onto his face, and began descending the stairs. He was barely halfway down when he recognised the sodden troublemaker.

_‘Larry!’_

It was Rippen. Rippen, pitiful. Rippen, pathetic. Rippen, sad and shouting and struggling against Matthews and Fredricks as if drowning in their resistance, soaked through to the skin, strands of hair sticking to his face, cheeks wet partly from rain and largely from tears. When he saw Larry he reached out and this time he was not halfhearted; he reached as if grabbing out to tear the sun from the sky.

_‘Larry!’_ Deafening, booming, shattering. ‘ _Larry!’_ Heaven-rending and roaring.

Larry remained on the stairs, frozen mid-step. The only movement was the stirring of his lips, whispering his confusion into the air. Was this a dream?

_‘Larry!’_ Rippen howled, and then, panting, heaving, weaker, ‘Larry,’ and then, hand falling to his side as he fell limp in the butlers’ grasp, ‘Larry...’

The name fell from his lips, softer each time until he was silent and he had succumbed to his defeat. The butlers dropped him and the floor beneath him shone, slick with rainwater trickling from his clothes and hair. One step, two steps, Larry further descended the staircase, not taking his eyes off the shaking, sorrowful form of the man knelt between his nightgowned servants.

Matthews, who had curlers in her hair and a green paste painted across her face, stepped forth and gestured towards Rippen, who stared up at Larry as if he had been caught thieving from a castle and was now facing its magnificent king. It would be punishment or it would be redemption. Regal in purple, elevated and slowly sinking to Rippen’s level (almost descending from heaven, illuminated by the lights above, high above in the ceiling, a halo of exhaustion around his head), he did not take his eyes off Rippen but listened to Matthews speak.

‘He called for you, sir,’ she said, with all the authority of a policewoman describing the crimes of a fresh never-do-well, ‘We told him that you had gone to bed, but he was insistent on seeing you, and we ordered him to leave the premises, to which he refused. Do you want us to send him on his way?’

An elegant way to say ‘kick him out’. Larry shook his head slowly, eyes still fixed on Rippen’s pitiable state, walking down the stairs with quiet deliberation.

‘No, no, there’s no need.’ The purple excess of his dressing gown trailed behind him. ‘Go get some rest, you guys, I’ll deal with this.’

The two disappeared up the stairs behind him. He and Rippen were alone. Slowly, he descended, slippers clicking on the cool marble floor. And so that was the scene, like something out of a film, a tragic romantic fantasy: the repenting lover soaked to the bone after making the long journey to redemption in the pouring rain, even the forces of heaven a paltry obstacle in the way of his aching confession; the one he’d done wrong, the one he’d taken for granted now desired and longed for and regal. The tables had turned – Larry was now the powerful one, with all of Rippen’s heart in his hands.

Rippen tried to speak, stammering and breathless. He’d slept through half of the day, tried to groom himself with all of his might, but the wind and rain of the evening had swept his pride away. Now he was here. On his knees, out of breath, trying in vain to plead his pitiful case to this man, this man that he loved.

Giving him no time to speak, Larry placed a hand on Rippen’s chest. He could feel that coal-black hear throb beneath his palm, feel its fluttering pulse like the tremor of music from a distant room, thrumming through walls and floors to reach whichever ears would listen closest.

‘Poor baby, you’re shivering,’ Larry whispered, worry permeating his face, ‘Your clothes are sticking to you. You’re gonna catch your death of cold, I swear...’

‘I’m not cold,’ Rippen began, but he was cut off by a shudder running through him. Good, too, as Larry clutched him tightly, hugging Rippen’s head to his chest. Now Rippen could hear Larry’s heart; it danced in his chest, anxious, nervous, uncertain, but the warmth of Larry’s body was addictive and Rippen was silenced. He didn’t want to ruin this. He wanted Larry to hold him, even if for a little longer.

‘Oh, you make yourself comfy on the couch. I’ll get you some dry clothes and something hot to drink.’

Taking his hands – sweating bullets through the palms but icy cold – Larry hurriedly guided him to an immense room with a domed, cherub-covered ceiling. Rippen was dazed. All of this felt unreal, as if he’d stepped out of reality, or died, or woken up in the wrong person’s body.

He allowed himself to be pushed down onto a scarlet couch in front of a massive fireplace. He allowed Larry to strip him. He allowed Larry to unbutton the topmost button of his soaked shirt, fumble his way down, peel the garment away from his skin and draw a breath at the sight. He did not flinch when Larry ran both hands down his side, marvelling at the curve of his hips and the swell of his chest, even though the glide of those fingertips tickled nigh unbearably. He would endure anything for him.

He allowed Larry to see him near-nude, vulnerable and shaking in his underwear, and allowed Larry to clothe him in silk (why Larry owned pyjamas in his size, Rippen did not ask) and knight him with a warm blanket, as blue as the sky and as cosy as a hug. This was his cape, and the mug of tea he was handed was his chalice, and Larry’s hand, which he held in his, was his sceptre, his shield, his defence and his weapon, with which he would protect himself now that his armour was gone.

Tender, as if it were glass and paper, Rippen ran his thumb over Larry’s knuckles, staring at the hand he held, wondering in awe at the warmth it radiated. The heat of the mug of tea in his other hand did not compare. He set it down on the table so he could take Larry’s hand in both of his, still panting and dizzy with exhaustion.

Warming his hands, Larry looked up at Rippen’s gaunt, bewildered face, only to ask, ‘Why did you come here?’

At first, Rippen didn’t hear him. ‘What?’

‘Why did you come all the way up here in the rain? I- I-’ Larry blinked, looked down, trailed off. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘I had to tell you something. It couldn’t wait. Not any longer.’

And as soon as it left his mouth, Rippen was lost for words. He had no idea how to carry on.

‘I’ve recently- I’ve discovered that- I’m- It’s rather- I’ve found myself-’

Wide-eyed, anticipating, Larry stared up at him. His heart skipped and thundered. _If you are finding it hard to speak, it is because your mouth is full, and you must swallow your pride._ He had no more to fear. He had no more to hide. One of his hands, as gentle as a bird alighting, travelled to Larry’s cheek, cupped his face. Their eyes met. Their eyes sparkled.

Just look at what you see in his face – kindness, goodness, sympathy, love – and let yourself confess.

In a sigh, in a breath, Rippen said, ‘Larry, I’m in love with you.’

Stunned silence. Larry froze. The corners of Rippen’s mouth twitched helplessly into a smile, then fell, rejected by the silence. Then Larry fell upon him, grabbing him in a fierce embrace, laughing until he was breathless.

‘Really?’ Larry could’ve pinched himself. A grin spread across his face until he was beaming bright and incredulous. ‘Really, really? You mean it? I- I must be dreaming, this has got to be a dream!’

‘Yes! _No!’_ The laugh was contagious. ‘I do, I do, I mean it! I don’t know why it took me so- so long to- to realise-! I don’t understand it myself, it all happened so- so very fast-!’

Upstairs, the butlers were listening closely – or, rather, Fredricks was, while Matthews tried to block out the laughter bubbling through the floorboards. Oh, to be young – oh, to be in love – oh, to be those two fellows, helpless with disbelief. Why this coincidence? Why this surprise? Why would the stars align in such a way to bring them together like this?

‘I can’t believe this!’ But he could. ‘Rippen, oh, Rippen, I love you too, I love you too!’

Rippen positively cackled; he was overwhelmed. This love had taken him in such a swoop and he was still dizzy from the height but why was he to care? Why was he to abstain completely from life’s delights and pleasures in the name of evil? Who was he to deny this if it had so unforseenly, so serendipitously swallowed him?

‘Oh, Larry, Larry, Larry-!’ He heaved, smiling as if it’d crack his face in two, and it seemed that he’d burst into sobs at any moment. Joy, strangely, had gripped him and he was helpless to its whims. ‘I love you. I love you so much. For so long, for so long, I’ve been so foolish, and I’m just _so-!’_

The words were stolen from his mouth by a gasping breath and Larry wiped at his face with his sleeve, sniffing back joyful tears. The unbelievable joy, the wonder, the magic, the _love_ was burning bright and hot and he was content to burn to death here.

‘How long, Rippen?’

‘God, since we met, I’ve just been blind. How could I not see it? You’ve never lost faith in me, and all it took was a week- to make me realise- how much you mean- to me-’

Briefly, he was taken by emotion, and could not speak; Larry spoke instead.

‘I _adore_ you, Rippen, and it’s always been that way. But I always thought you wouldn’t feel the same way, because... well- the way you treated me! Like I wasn’t even second best- like I wasn’t even number two...’

Rippen’s lip shook between his teeth, and he gasped out, between lurching breaths that fought to barricade back heaving sobs.

‘You’re more than number two, Larry, you’re number one, you’re one in a million, you mean all the worlds to me.’ And what he spoke was true. ‘You’re wonderful.’ Tears rolled down his cheeks now, his face contorting unhandsomely as he tried to smile through the downpour, as if the glow of his heart would shine through those tigrish teeth. Again, with all the sincerity in the world, ‘You’re _wonderful._ ’

So the two fell together, Larry collapsing into Rippen’s arms with a squealing cry of delirium, of ecstasy, and Rippen fell backwards with a shuddering groan, eventually giving way to hysterical too-high laughter, as if this glorious dream was causing him to completely lose his mind.

He loved him.

He loved him, he loved him, he loved him.

Who loved whom? Both loved the other. They reminded each other of this in breathless flurries, little whispers of _I love you baby_ and _you’re the best thing that’s happened to me_ , until they both believed it, until there was no doubt left to be had, until their hearts swelled and the eavesdropping butlers – who now included Matthews, who’d succumbed to curiosity and was listening slack-jawed with her ear pressed to the floor - were dancing with a joy that spread throughout the house.

They remained in each other’s arms until they were both quiet; no longer frantic with emotions but content, the spilling foam of the bottled-up affection now settling into a sweet, still froth; listening to each other’s hearts as Larry laid his head, a welcome weight, on Rippen’s chest; fingers still interlaced as if they were sculpted as part of a set, as if they were created to interlock in this way like two halves of a friendship necklace.

This is the way they remained, unspeaking, words unneeded, until both knew the meaning of the word –

_Adoration –_

\- And until Rippen fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait, again! Hope you guys (guy?) enjoy this one.


	7. Sunday

Sunday. Rippen awoke, groggy and dizzy, on an unfamiliar couch. What had happened last night?

He looked up, one arm lolling off the sofa in a picture of lazy tranquillity, and saw the domed ceiling, covered in carven cherubs, all of which bore a striking resemblance to –

Oh, yes.

Oh, _yes._

He sat up sharply. Silken pyjamas, just his size, still wondering how Larry got them to fit so well. A sky-blue cloak of a blanket, as if he were wearing a summer’s day around his shoulders. It was still raining outside. At last, a little consistency. The patter of rain on the roof was the consolation that he needed – this was no dream. This was a new awakening.

Matthews was by his side, setting a tray on the table before him. The corners of her mouth twitched. She was visibly suppressing a smile. Such a stoic face, cheeks trembling, eyes averting, if she even thought about this man- and that man- and this _love-_ she would burst with glee. The artist had been alone for so long; the principal’s home had felt so empty; Master Larry had felt such darkness in this sprawling home, as if all the luck in the world could not fill his heart or these halls. And now he was full. And now he was here.

On the tray was a glass of orange juice; a pile of slices of buttered toast with a small (so _tiny,_ almost comical) jar of strawberry jam; two fried eggs; bacon and, to the side, a tangerine. Yesterday he’d had so little appetite that he’d not eaten anything at all, but now his hunger gripped him and he had to mutter his thanks through a mouthful of food. It was _good._ Obviously the work of a sleepless chef, but so good. The eggs were a little overdone, the toast a little pale for his liking (his liking was charcoaled), but he devoured the meal.

‘When you’re done, Mr Rippen,’ Matthews interrupted, and Rippen looked up with crumbs all over his face and a mouth full of toast, ‘Master Larry would like to see you upstairs. In his room.’

She left, and Rippen wiped his mouth on a white serviette, leaving the tangerine unpeeled, the jam jar unopened, and the glass of juice half emptied. Honestly, opening the tiny little jam jar would feel like tearing the top off of a dollhouse. But he had better things to think about now. Now, the long journey up the stairs, through the hall, bare feet tickled by the soft carpets, and to the door of Larry’s room, awaited him, and he took the journey with anticipation thick in his breath. His hand hesitated on the doorknob. He felt almost like the golden glow would come off on his fingers. He knocked the door with a closed fist.

‘Come in!’

Larry’s voice was the peal of a bell, not a death knell but the happy clangour of a church calling out the news; love was here. Rippen pushed the door open. Larry was inside. He sat on his bed, in the same lilac pyjamas but now an oversized white robe. The excess material that bunched around his neck, at his wrists and at his ankles, was as thick and as fluffy as the feathers of some fantastic swan; almost like a feather boa or a mink stole made of snow. He was gleaming. He was resplendent.

Rippen was lost, but this loss was familiar, not unwanted; he was lost exactly where he wanted to be.

‘Did you mean it?’ he asked. ‘Do you...?’

Beaming, Larry beckoned him forwards. Rippen shut the door gently behind himself.

‘Yes,’ Larry said, voice soft and full of awe, as if coaxing a frightened bird out of its nest. ‘I love you, Rippen. I _love_ you.’

And he was telling the truth. Rippen knew. His face twisted with emotion, into a pained grimace then a wavering smile and finally a beaming grin, and he stepped forwards, falling onto one knee before the man that’d become number one in his life.

He tried to say ‘I love you’ back, but he was incapacitated by a tightness in his chest, and he was barely able to do more than gasp and dart his eyes across Larry, taking in parts of him and loving every one.

‘Uh...’

Larry reached out a hand and gently tilted Rippen’s head up, a forefinger under his chin and his thumb only just brushing his lower lip.

‘You’ve got a little, uh, jam on your face, sugar...’

Reaching out, Larry held out a thumb, words trailing away. Rippen now looked at him not in glances but in one big picture, one marvellous painting of one small man, glowing and radiant with kindness and love. He would not follow this man or force him to walk behind; he would walk by this man’s side until the end of the worlds.

‘Hold still, let me get it for you...’

His words were barely a mutter. Larry’s thumb brushed against Rippen’s cheek. Deliciously intimate. Rippen knew it was a lie. He hadn’t had any jam with his breakfast, hadn’t even unscrewed the jar. Closing his eyes, savouring the sensation, he opened them again to see Larry’s face, mesmerised, his perpetually-smiling lips fallen neutral and slightly ajar.

He leaned forwards.

The initial kiss was chaste and brief. Only a touch. They pulled away again after a second. It only took them a second to become hooked, however, Rippen feeling the craving ignite within him and Larry, knowing that the other man would freeze up like this, grabbed him by the collar of the pyjamas of vague discern and pulled him into a second kiss that burned like fire, so brilliantly that Rippen felt embers in his chest and coals in his shoulders.

Both of Larry’s hands seized Rippen’s head, hair coarse around his fingers, pulling the bedhead into further disarray as he tested fervently to make sure he was real. His lips were chapped. If they weren’t so soft they’d have felt like stone. Rippen’s hands were everywhere, unsure of where to rest, until they finally settled on Larry’s shoulders, sliding shortly down to his upper arms but then staying there, decided. He could taste sweet fruits on the other man’s lips. So soft, melting him, all thought becoming a mush of joy, and then they finally pulled apart, out of breath.

Love conquered Rippen’s features and he smiled, wide and fascinated and awed. His lips still burned. Larry's love had been tattooed onto his mouth; passion onto his soul and warmth onto his heart. Light began to shine inside of him again. Everything slowly began to make so much more sense than before. He  _knew._ The sun filtering in through the curtains; the rain’s drumming growing distant; the smell of morning and fresh bedsheets; Rippen trembled and smiled and shook his head in disbelief.

‘I adore you,’ he said, and that is what he meant.

 

**EPILOGUE.**

That Monday, the following day, the two had walked in together, arm in arm. Seeing Rippen smile while entering the school was an oddity in itself. Seeing him in such a good mood was even stranger. His usual scathing critiques were laced with subtle positivities; maybe a student’s art was ‘uninspired and uninspiring’ but his palette was ‘nice’. Another student was told her work was ‘trite’ but ‘showed great promise’. The insults on their own would have been upsetting but familiar. With the addition of _positive_ comments, it was just disconcerting.

Rippen and Larry disappeared at lunch, and returned a few minutes late, but the class was not impatient. In fact, they were mostly hoping Rippen not to turn up at all, but when he did, he was radiant with contentedness and they were confused; it was as if someone had breathed the life back into him, resuscitated his hope – even if it was still pale and distant, it was in a stable condition.

Penn Zero watched the two leave the school when the bell rang. They did not go by car and they did not hurry. They walked side by side, arms around each other’s waists, and the hordes of children eager to escape parted to let them through. They had met on the corridor and, almost seamlessly, neither stopping their leisurely stroll, they slipped their arms around each other and walked that way. People were surprised (and unsurprised); rumours were whispered (and not); the music teacher turned up her nose in envy and the coach’s whistle fell from his mouth but neither the principal nor the artist looked back or aside, only forwards.

‘Huh.’

Penn shrugged to himself as his friends caught up with him.

Maybe Rippen hadn't needed his help after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this was so late, and the chapter is so short! I think it serves its purpose, though. Ties the story together neatly. Hope you enjoyed!

**Author's Note:**

> Ta much for reading, I hope this ship gets more popular!  
> Feedback would be much appreciated, and thanks for the comments so far! Was the characterisation okay? I've finished PZ, but I'm still a little rocky.


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